happy birthday to the hubs

Shea,

I wish I would have known you when you wore this outfit. I would have kissed those little cheeks and straightened your little tie.

I wish I would have known you when you were collecting pewter figurines for no apparent reason. Or when you flipped through your thousands of baseball cards. Or fought with your X-Men. Or danced your way to stardom.

I wish I would have known you when you played baseball, stuffed your face with big league chew and dominated center field.

I wish I would have known you when you attended your proms, chose your college and took out all those loans.

I wish I would have known you when you lived in a house with 12 guys... well, not really.

I wish I would have known you when you graduated from college, bought your condo, suffered through your first jobs. When you adopted Mac and ate spaghetti every night for dinner.

But I'm really glad I get to know you (and be married to you!) for the rest of our lives.

Happy 27th birthday!

Love,
Wifey

petty thankfulness

Let it be known, I am in fact most thankful for my faith, husband, family, roof over my head, healthy body, food in my pantry (like I have one of those..) and money in my bank account.

But I'm also thankful for these other really unimportant things.

Facebook
How else would I know who is mad at whom and deleted them as a friend in an immature rage, when my 10-year high school reunion is or who is connecting with a random song lyric today. I mean, thank goodness for that last nugget of information.

The floor of Shea's car
In the case that I should wonder what Shea's been up to the last year, my curiosity is quickly curbed by a look-sey into his car. Receipts, smashed paper cups, church bulletins, Gatorade bottles, junk mail and hats.

Fine point, retractable Sharpies
I love them. Love. Love. Love.

Right turns on red
There is one intersection near my work where you cannot turn on red. This makes me realize how much I appreciate the turning-on-red rule. Also, U-turns. I like those, too.

My mattress
When we got married, we had the option of a $600 mattress that would eventually sag in the middle and push our bodies on top of each other during sleep or a $1,500 mattress that made me want to live in my bed. Best $1,500 we've ever spent.

Brussels sprouts
I had them at a restaurant this past weekend, in butter and roasted. Shockingly, this was my first experience with this vegetable and even more shockingly, I am in love with them.

K-State basketball
It makes things way more fun to be cheering for a top five team. For example, tonight I get to go to a No. 1 vs. No. 3 game at Sprint Center. It will be loud, nerve wracking, blood pumping fun.

Kansas City weather
I know I beat this dead horse a lot, but I am super thankful that there is no ice, no snow, no freezing cold. Just a nice cool Thanksgiving with sun and fall jackets.

this city

Kansas City, you are looking especially extraordinary this weekend.

praying for anapra

Tomorrow, my mom heads to Mexico. Not the part where there is turquoise water, white sand beaches and overflowing fruit platters. But the part you read about in the news.

We first went to Anapra in 2000 with my youth group. Back then it was just sand, cinder block houses with no electricity or running water. We came to help build a new school in a Juarez neighborhood where parents locked their kids at home so they wouldn't get into trouble while they rode a bus to a factory and worked for $1/hour. Along came a pastor, Antonio, who saw a need and moved his family to Juraez so he could teach adults to read and write in this room made of palettes and cardboard.

And then we arrived and helped pour the concrete for a new building. It took a week to build just the floor - mixing concrete by hand, twisting metal into rebar. At the end of the week, a bunch of teenagers stood in a circle around our concrete slab. We listened to prayers in Spanish and a man talk tearfully about how he'd found God that week.

"Asi alumbre vuestra luz delante de los hombres, para que vean vuestros buenos trabajos y glorifiquen a vuestro Padre que esta en los cielos." Mateo 5:16

And then other churches came. Buildings were built. Tile laid. Chalkboards hung. The Colegio Susana Wesley was born.

Four years ago, my family went back for Thanksgiving. And that little slab of concrete is now many buildings. It's a beautiful, vibrant school. 

And the kids are amazing. 

But as the situation in Juarez has deteriorated so has Anapra.The volunteers don't come as often. Antonio and his wife, Dina, are at risk for extortion or kidnapping because of their local status. The funding sources, who are also struggling to maintain their own budgets, aren't giving as much away.

So my mom and a team of people will go back this week to help out with repairs around the school. They will deliver supplies and a lot of love. It's the least they can do for the two people and their staff who give their lives in service in the face of violence because they believe in education and in God's love.

This week I'm praying. For my mom and the team's safety. For the kids of Anapra who grow up with the odds stacked against them. For the families who can look outside their cardboard houses and see the lights of the El Paso gated communities where there is enough food, enough education, enough jobs and enough safety. For our hearts to be moved - whether it's risking our comfort and safety to serve, collecting school supplies and clothing to give away because we have more than enough or simply signing up for the school's newsletter and praying.

And as we eat ourselves into a food coma next Thursday, make a list of all the stuff we want for Christmas, attend holiday parties and complain about the burden of our jobs, car repairs, the cost of decorations or the stress of family get-togethers, I hope we pause.

i'm a citizen, really.

I love my passport. It's evidence of all the places I've experienced, expect for the one time I went to Paraguay in the back of the van - no passport stamps there!

However, I have a beef with the State Department. My current passport was issued in 2004, meaning it still has a good four years left. But, my name has changed. If my passport would have been issued within the last year, it'd be a FREE passport update. But since it's been six years, I have to pay $110 for a new one. $110 to prove I am a U.S. citizen!

Not only that, but I have to give up my cute, smiling picture for a no makeup, no jewelry, no smile, white background, crappy camera photo that makes me look like I've single-handedly raised 10 kids and not slept for three months. Joy.

And my quest to fill all the pages of my passport will fail despite the fact Argentina seems to give a stamp every time you cross the street. Let's hope Belize and Guatemala are also liberal with their stamping.

On the plus side, I do appreciate the fact I can drop off my application and horrifying photos at the post office instead of mailing them to Philly - that saves me five bucks at least. Bargain shopping! You can find a passport acceptance facility near you here. 

a burger, a tap dancer and a fetus

Last week, I looked like this everyday.

Then Friday,  I felt much much better. We do this dance at least once every six months. I get super sick, do blood work that shows I am in fact, super sick and my lower region organs are not functioning properly. The blood tests they do are silly (hepatitis, really?) and show nothing. Occasionally they will stick a tube down my throat or in other unmentionable regions and also, find nothing. Then I will feel better and feel like I'd rather just assume this will never happen again and forgo more invasive tubes. One day we will have an answer. Or not.

Since I was feeling better and the most I had eaten in one sitting the entire week was half a cup of rice, I celebrated by eating a half pound hamburger. And my friends, it was FABULOUS. We met some very dear friends of mine from a previous job at The Phoenix jazz club and saw Lonnie McFadden, local singing and tap dancing legend.

Happy days! The rest of my weekend included watching Layne play volleyball where I was forced to cheer for KU, eating chili and playing Scrabble with the fam. The big finale was my favorite friend Edie's baby shower!

She thinks she looks like a big house mostly because the little guy is poking his butt into her ribs and generating a lot of acid. Kind of rude for such an innocent little fetus. I, however, think she has the cutest baby bump ever. Little Herbie is a lucky man.

saying nothing

I went to the doctor yesterday for my week-long saga of nausea, dizziness and generally feeling awful. As is the trend, my doctor assumed I was pregnant. Even though I explained the timing is not logical.

We did determine my blood pressure is too low when I am standing. More on par with numbers for small children or professional athletes. No cure, just "hang onto something when you stand up."

I am then escorted back to the lab where I ask to lay down for my barrage of blood work since needles and staying conscious seem to be a problem lately.Then I had to ask for water so that I could eventually pee in a cup (high maintenance patient here).

When I am done, I walk to another room and put my pee cup in a sink. I have to sit in a chair while the lab tech does the pregnancy and UTI test in front of me. She's joking about the machines doing two tests at once and casually rustling her papers around. I'm reading a letter from God to his children typed in comic sans pasted to the wall. I am positive that my God would never send letters in such a disturbing font.

When it's done, she says nothing.

I have to walk with her to a copy room where she tapes the test results to another sheet and makes copies. She says nothing. We walk back over to the doctors office together, and she hands my results to the nurse saying, "here are your answers." The nurse walks with me to the exam room and says, "I'll show him these results, and he'll be back in to talk to you about them." She says nothing about the actual results.

Now I have to wait 10 minutes before the doctor returns to tell me I am not pregnant, which I already knew but was starting to feel borderline-crazy about.

So now I am waiting for blood work results. I'm hoping for a nice infection that requires just a few pills to make me feel brand new but assures Shea that dressing me in my pajamas when I fall asleep at 8:30 with a computer on my lap wasn't just a ploy.